CHINA GP – QUALIFYING RESULTS – KIMI RÄIKKÖNEN SPACE

It was an exciting qualifying session at the Shanghai track today. Come the end of the hour long grid deciding session, the two Mercedes locked out the front row, with Hamilton on pole in 1.35.782 and Rosberg second with a 1.35.824. Sebastian Vettel will start from the second row in his Ferrari, third fastest with a 1.36.687. Kimi Raikkonen is sixth, separated from his team-mate by the Williams duo of Massa and Bottas. [ferrari.com]

Final Times:

Pos	Driver	Car	Time	Gap
1	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1m35.782s	–
2	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1m35.824s	0.042s
3	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1m36.687s	0.905s
4	Felipe Massa	Williams/Mercedes	1m36.954s	1.172s
5	Valtteri Bottas	Williams/Mercedes	1m37.143s	1.361s
6	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1m37.232s	1.450s
7	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull/Renault	1m37.540s	1.758s
8	Romain Grosjean	Lotus/Mercedes	1m37.905s	2.123s
9	Felipe Nasr	Sauber/Ferrari	1m38.067s	2.285s
10	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber/Ferrari	1m38.158s	2.376s
11	Pastor Maldonado	Lotus/Mercedes	1m38.134s	–
12	Daniil Kvyat	Red Bull/Renault	1m38.209s	–
13	Max Verstappen	Toro Rosso/Renault	1m38.393s	–
14	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso/Renault	1m38.538s	–
15	Sergio Perez	Force India/Mercedes	1m39.290s	–
16	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India/Mercedes	1m39.216s	–
17	Jenson Button	McLaren/Honda	1m39.276s	–
18	Fernando Alonso	McLaren/Honda	1m39.280s	–
19	Will Stevens	Marussia/Ferrari	1m42.091s	–
20	Roberto Merhi	Marussia/Ferrari	1m42.842s	–

QUOTES + STUFF

#Kimi7: Right now its disappointing where we finished. But there’s nothing we can do now #ChineseGP #SkyF1 pic.twitter.com/4l3PWrkDrR

— KimiRäikkönenSpace (@EvenstarSaima) April 11, 2015

#Kimi7:”I just had a bad lap for some reason. First three corners felt very slippery on the rears. #ChineseGP pic.twitter.com/SxTARqDvnA — KimiRäikkönenSpace (@EvenstarSaima) April 11, 2015

From autosport.com – Kimi: “It is just how difficult it was in the first three corners in the last try,” said Raikkonen when explaining what had gone wrong. “I lost so much time in corner three basically that I was a bit surprised. The car had been behaving very well and in the last run it was not so easy there for some reason. The laptime was pretty much done there – you couldn’t catch up.”

Raikkonen was convinced that the change of wind direction had not been a factor. “Obviously it was different from yesterday but I don’t know what happened. I got a loose car and lost an awful lot of time from that corner to the next corner. Maybe it is my fault. Maybe it just happened. But it is disappointing anyhow. It is not a complete disaster, but it seems to become a habit. I would rather get rid of it. For the race we have a good car. It has been behaving well all weekend. Today was not ideal with the last set of tyres, but we will do our best for tomorrow and see where we end up.”

From espn.co.uk – Kimi: “We have had a pretty okay weekend, but surprisingly enough on the last try something wasn’t correct. I’m not complaining that something wasn’t correct, but it was a shit lap in that one area and the reasons for it we don’t know. It’s disappointing for me and I’m disappointed in myself that it has ended up this way again because it makes it much more difficult to start in that position. Tomorrow is another day and we expect the car to be good in the race, but that doesn’t make life easy to start in that position.”

From Scuderia Ferrari – Kimi:“I’m disappointed with the result, my car was behaving pretty well most of the time but in in my last run I was not able to put a good lap together. For some reason the handling of the car was different, more loose than in the previous laps and slippery on the rear especially in the first three corners. It’s a shame because in the previous sessions I had been satisfied with the behaviour. My starting position for the race tomorrow it’s not ideal , but I expect to have the same good car we’ve had so far. We’ll try to do our best and I’m sure that with a good start we can extract the best result out of the situation.”